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My Second Day at Denver Art Museum Designer Demos…

My second day “demonstrating” design at the Denver Art Museum designer studio was really fun! It was very hard to demonstrate, though, as I got a lot of people coming in to ask questions. I explained the process of haute couture to someone who works at the Denver Art Museum. I found it surprising when a few people asked me if Yves Saint Laurent sewed everything…Hoo, boy, that would take several lifetimes of working 24 hours a day to accomplish that. Makes me think of a Brothers Grimm tale…No, Yves Saint Laurent had the best seamstresses, patternmakers and drapers working with him. All couturiers have only the best. Have trouble sewing on a button? Well, these people do not and they would sew it so perfectly that you would think they had made it as if by magic (almost).

I met a very interesting designer from Kansas City, Ann Brownfield, who said she has started a museum there – a tribute to the 75 garment factories that were once there. She said she longed for the days when people dressed up…I understand that myself, even though I don’t dress up a lot, I get a little sad when I see that so many people don’t care at all anymore. It’s a karmic situation, though, as we all will look back on our photos and say, “Oh, there I am wearing a t-shirt and jeans. Oh, and there I am also wearing a t-shirt and jeans…”

I also had a great discussion with an industrial designer. He creates and revises machines – such as copiers and other such equipment. He had a lot of questions about my process and of course, we found similarities in our creative processes. A grandfather bought one of my special YSL bags from the gift shop for his granddaughter who had asked me questions previously. It was very nice – and I signed “Happy Birthday ” , XO, and my name on my price tag for her birthday. Very sweet.

My former intern, Chris, dropped in with his parents to say hi. He didn’t realize I was going to be there but was happy to see me and we caught up – although we’re both on Facebook and we pretty much know what’s happening with each other if we only take a look at each other’s profiles…haha! He’s in design school in New York and is also modeling. I’m so excited for him as I know from experience how much living in New York can do for how one views the world.

One of my favorite moments so far was when I met Lucca. Her grandparents told me that while they were walking through the YSL show, Lucca couldn’t wait to come down to talk to me. She sat patiently while I was talking to someone else and then finally, her grandfather said, “My granddaughter would like to show you something.” So Lucca tentatively came up to me with a fashion sketch she had done. And it was really good! You’ll see the sketch above. It says, “Lucca 2012 Collection”. Then she showed me photos on her I-Pad which she had taken of her dolls wearing very cool clothes. I forgot the name of the dolls but they were pretty cool. So she took photos of one of the dolls in various poses and including laying the doll/model in the grass in a very professional photo shoot kind of way! It was wonderful and impressive and so much fun! The media access that children have now is changing the world – and in Lucca’s case, in a great way. It was a pleasure to meet her.

I’ll be back next week and in the meantime, I need to do some more work on the appliques/rosettes/etc. so that I can actually start seriously applying them.